[Zloty]

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West leads 2 of ♥
East wins with King of ♥ and plays As of ♥
Which card west discards on?

[kuhchung]

ruff, SA?

[manudude03]

If declarer is 0472, we need partner to lead another heart, if 1471 or 2470 he is simply down. I will just discard whatever encourages the heart the most depending on what discards we are playing. I really don't think declarer will have less than 7 diamonds, and partner won't have 7 hearts being 3rd seat nv with a suit headed by AK.

[Hanoi5]

Although ♠A can do the trick, any card that says you don't want a spade should be clear.

[kuhchung]

manudude03, on 2014-January-31, 12:36, said:

If declarer is 0472, we need partner to lead another heart, if 1471 or 2470 he is simply down. I will just discard whatever encourages the heart the most depending on what discards we are playing. I really don't think declarer will have less than 7 diamonds, and partner won't have 7 hearts being 3rd seat nv with a suit headed by AK.

oh right

[johnu]

Hanoi5, on 2014-January-31, 13:06, said:

Although ♠A can do the trick, any card that says you don't want a spade should be clear.

Would you be happy if partner returns a club? Zloty usually posts double dummy puzzles or hands from bridge books or columns, and this looks like a sample hand. And in the sample hand, ♠A is the card that says don't expect any side suit tricks, I have a trump promotion if you lead a heart.

[mikeh]

This is a very old theme. The simple answer is that at imps or at rubber or total points one pitches the spade A.

You cannot possibly have a stiff spade! Not only does that give S an impossible number of spades (clearly S is not playing roman/tartan jumps and has long diamonds) but if it were stiff, it is always going to score a trick.

So this is a play that is sometimes referred to as an 'alarm-clock' signal...intended to wake partner up.

This was almost certainly taken from some old book on defence because in the modern game, S's 4♦ would show spades and diamonds.

Note that discouraging spades won't do the trick.....partner will think that we want a club more often than that we want a diamond. Picture S with Ax Qxx AKQxxxx x, or the same hcp but 2=3=6=2 shape. Now, that may seem like a bad example, and maybe it is, but hands taken from old books on play will often be based on auctions that look silly to modern eyes (and, yes, I see that there was a weak 2 involved, but they've been around for more than 50 years now).

[HighLow21]

Discard A♠. If partner then leads a spade, throttle him! ;-)

[Zloty]

Best reply HighLow21 Cannot be more explicit to ask ♥